J&K: Ripened apples fail to cheer farmers in Valley as migrant workers exit

By Express News Service

SRINAGAR:  Exodus of migrant labourers and forecast of bad weather amid the apple harvest season are keeping fruit growers in Kashmir on edge.  Fruit producers, especially apple farmers, are facing shortage of labour as well as increase in labour cost due to the sudden exit of farm workers  after the spate in targeted killings by militants. Adding to their woes is the weather advisory of heavy rain and snow in the Valley from October 22 to 24.

Mohammad Ashraf, president of Fruit Mandi Shopian, told this newspaper that apple farmers have been severely affected. “Only 10-20 per cent of apples in Shopian district have been harvested so far. Migrant workers have left amid the harvest season. The packaging of apple boxes has also been affected,” he said.Ashraf said the work in all the cold storages (around 50) in south Kashmir, which have a total capacity to store 2 lakh metric tonnes of apple, has also been badly hit.  

“The produce is supposed to be kept in cold storage within 24 hours of harvest but for the last four days, thousands of apple cartons are lying unattended due to non-availability of labourers,” Ashraf said adding, “Large quantity of apples are likely to be damaged”. Shopian produces about 3 lakh MT of apples per year, while Kashmir produced 16 lakh MT of the fruit last year.

Kashmir Fruit Growers and Traders’ Union president Basheer Ahmad Basheer said most of the non-local traders, who had come to purchase apple from the Valley, have left. “And those who have not left are confined indoors,” he said. Basheer said the weather advisory, which has predicted heavy rains and snowfall has added to the woes. “It is impossible to harvest the remaining apple crop (around 40 per cent in north Kashmir)  in two days in the absence of labourers,” he said.

NIA RAIDS 11 LOCATIONS, arrests fourNew Delhi: Intensifying its crackdown on terror networks and overground workers (OGWs) of terror outfits, the NIA on Wednesday raided 11 locations and arrested four people for their alleged involvement in terror activities, taking the total number of such arrests to nine. The searches were carried out at four locations in Srinagar, two places each in Baramulla and Awantipora, among others.  The searches included raids at houses of Arif Manzoor Sheikh of Fatehgarh and Hurriyat (Geelani) activist Abdul Rashid Rather of Audora.